The girl rode forward beside Blake, her face radiant. She paid him the highest of compliments by taking his riding as a matter of course; but in her eyes was a look strangely like that of his wife's fond gaze,--a look of pride at his achievement, rather than admiration. "We'll ride ahead of the team to keep clear of the dust," she remarked. He twisted about and saw that Ashton was starting to drive after them. His wife's elderly maid was waving her handkerchief from one of the car windows. The porter and the manservant stood at attention. He exchanged a nod and smile with his wife, patted Rocket's arched neck and clicked to him to start. "This is great, Miss Knowles!" he said. "I did not look for such fun, first crack out of the box. And--if you don't mind my saying it--it's such a jolly surprise your being what you are." The girl blushed with pleasure. "I--we have been so eager to meet you," she murmured. She added hurriedly, "On account of your wonderful work as an engineer, you know." "I wouldn't have suspected Ashton of bragging for me," he replied. "Oh, he--he says you have a remarkable knack of hitting on the solution of problems. But it's in the engineering journals and reports that we've read about your work. Perhaps that is why you thought we had met before. After reading about you so much, I felt that I already knew you, and so my manner, you know--" He shook his head at this seemingly ingenuous explanation. "No, there is something about your voice and face--" His eyes clouded with the grief of a painful memory; his head sank forward until his square chin touched his broad chest. He muttered brokenly: "But that's impossible.... Anyway--better for them they died--better than to live after...." Behind her veil the girl's face became deathly white. He raised his head and looked at her with a wistful gleam of hope. She had averted her face from him and was gazing off at the hills with dim unseeing eyes. "Pardon me, Miss Knowles," he said, "but do you mind if I ask what is your first name?" She hesitated almost imperceptibly before replying: "I am called Chuckie--Chuckie Knowles. Doesn't that sound cowgirlish? We always have a chuck-wagon on the round-ups, you know. But it's a name that used to be quite common in the West." "Yes, it comes from the Spanish Chiquita," he said. He repeated the word with the soft caressing Spanish accent, "_Che-kee-tah!_" A flood of scarlet swept up into the girl's pallid face, and slowly subsided to her normal rich coloring. After a short silence she asked in a conventional tone: "I suppose you are glad to get away from Chicago. The last papers we received say that the East is sweltering in one of those smothery heat waves." "It's the humidity and close air that kills," said Blake. "I ought to know. I lived for years in the slums." "Oh, you--you really speak of it--openly!" the girl exclaimed. "What of it?" he asked, astonished in turn at her lack of tact.